Author's Note: Once again, let me reiterate my disbelief at the fact that some people like this story… I was expecting so many flames by now. All your comments are greatly appreciated; thanks so much for giving me the motivation to write.

Stranger

Chapter Three

You must ask questions you want to know the answers to…

So many questions were buzzing through his head, giving their best interpretation of a swarm of flies or bees. Like an awaiting frog, or, in his case, an awaiting turtle, he snatched each one from their air and let the words slid across his tongue.

"What's your name?" he asked, almost breathlessly. A name to a face, he thought, I need a name to a face.

"Well, some people call me Blue, others Righty, but my given name is Danni." She replied breezily, an old pain surfacing at the admittance to her less than desirable nicknames.

"That's a pretty name." he offered with a grin as he forever inscribed it into his brain. Danni, he thought; it suited her. Not quite feminine and not completely masculine, but a healthy mix of both worlds.

"What about you, Stranger? Have you got a name as well?" Danni asked, curiosity making her eyebrows raise, her dark eyes shinning with a light he had only glimpsed a select few times. His heart skipped a beat- was she as curious about him as he was about her?

"Michelangelo." He replied as smoothly as possible, trying to sound suave, like his brothers, "But most people call me Mikey-except for one of my brothers… he likes to call me a knucklehead." He winced, rubbing at the back of his head on reflex. He watched her face register his name, and then she smiled. Michelangelo might have fallen off the roof with joy if his ninja training hadn't beaten any notion of being able to fall from anything out of him almost entirely.

"I like it." She said, "It reminds me of that famous artist… I think he painted the Sistine Chapel, I read about it in one of the books I have in my personal library."

"That's because I was named after him." He replied excitedly. She liked to read, huh? That was great! Maybe she liked comic books too?

"What do you like to read?" he asked before he could stop himself; he knew that he had wanted to ask something else first! Oh well, he decided, he might as well just go with the flow of things.

"Oh, just about anything I can get my grubby little mitts on!" she replied, his keen and fixed attention on her allowing him to pick up the excitement blossoming on her features. Maybe he would stay away from the tough questions-he liked seeing her like this. It felt… special, somehow. It was like she was showing him a side of her that she rarely showed anyone else. He felt privileged and, quite strangely, more alive than he'd felt in a while. Was this how Donatello felt when he talked 'nerd' with April? How Leonardo felt when he'd accomplished a new move? How Raphael felt when he rode his motorcycle?

"What about you, do you read at all?" she asked hopefully.

"I read comics, mostly." He returned, grinning sheepishly even though she couldn't see him do it. He inched closer to her, a tightness in him sparking a fire that ignited his entire body. Curiosity propelled him forward again before their moment could die.

A fly landed, and the words spilled forth before he could stop them.

"What happened to you?" he asked as nicely as he could. Her smile deadened a little, and his heart skipped another beat as his stomach plummeted to the ground. He had definitely chosen the wrong question-stupid curiosity!

"I knew that would come up…" she whispered, but then smiled again, "but like I said, I think I can trust you." She said and then slowly peeled back her bangs and lifted the headband that had been tormenting Michelangelo for weeks. As an added touch, she rolled her shirt off her left shoulder, exposing the emptiness.

What he saw made him stare, and his heart clench tightly- he wanted to scream.

"Who did this to you?" he demanded, his eyes tracing the scars over the empty eye socket and remains of what had to have been an arm at one time- now only a shoulder remained.

"I'll tell you," she replied evenly as she pulled the sleeve of her shirt back up, "if you come into the light. Equivalent exchange and all that." Her face was stiff, and even from his distance he could see the question of rejection haunting her gaze. All his instincts screamed at him to run, that this was a step he was not meant to take, but his big 'bleeding heart' as his brothers called it, compelled him forward.

With the agility of a ninja, he propelled himself forward and landed with nary a sound on the fire escape in the shadows beside Danni. He took a second more to push all his inhibitions aside, and with a frantic heart and screaming and alert ninja senses, he stepped into the light.

He watched her face flicker like the flames of a candle. He watched it contort first to alarm, to confusion, and then to an emotion he couldn't quite identify- curiosity perhaps? His heart was choking him- he felt the city suffocating him. He trembled like a newborn infant taking its first breath and felt all the trepidation of a gangly child on the first day of school all at one moment.

Slowly, she reached out to him with shaking fingers- so slowly in fact that it took him a moment more than usual to realize she was moving at all. Curiosity had bloomed on Danni's features, and for a moment he held his breath as the world plummeted from underneath his feet again. Her fingers brushed against his cheeks, surprisingly cold against his warmth.

"Cold hands." He managed to croak out with a crooked smile. He watched her smile.

"You're not scary at all. Not like the tabloids and newspapers make you seem, at least. You're so warm." She murmured quietly, almost to herself. She gasped in surprise, moments later, as his fingers moved out to brush against the scarred side of her face.

"Beautiful." He said with a grin as he traced around the brutal scar tissue surrounding her eye. It trailed down her cheek, and even went slightly across the bridge of her nose- thin lines that were soft and supple-like baby's skin. Unexpected, he had expected it to be tough and rough.

"It's soft." He said in surprise, and he was rewarded with a smile.

"It's not scaly or slimy." She replied as she prodded his face with her fingers.

"So, what happened?" he asked quietly as they moved apart and she reseated herself on her window seat, and he found a seat on one of the steps of the fire escape, comfortably nestled in the shadows.

"So… what happened?" he asked quietly.

"The gang wars." She whispered, a far-off look diminishing the light in her eyes.

"The Purple Dragons took everything. My family and I were caught in the middle of it. I'm the only one who survived…if you call this surviving. I'm not even a person… I'm only half of one." She murmured.

"Who told you that?" Michelangelo asked, searching her face for the light that had once graced it.

"Everyone tells me that anymore." She whispered quietly, "Without my arm I can't do anything, never mind how my face looks. It's so ugly, I scare people."

"For what it's worth, I think you're a great person." Michelangelo said quietly, and then, he took a leap he never thought he'd make;

"I also think you're beautiful. You're like a….like a light, I guess." He said, and he could feel a distinct blush tint his green skin as she turned to him, startled. He thanked the shadows for concealing it.

"I'm not beautiful… you've seen my face Michelangelo. How can something like that be beautiful?"

"A wise man once said to that beauty is not what is on the outside… but what's on the inside." Michelangelo murmured quietly, his Master coming to mind as he stared at Danni under the light of New York City at night. He couldn't see the stars in the city, but if he could, he was pretty sure that she would drown out their light. He hadn't been this close to any human since April and Casey. It was like culture shock, he guessed, but it was oddly pleasant. Like the feeling you get when you have finally crossed over a difficult bridge.

"You're beautiful." He reiterated, "It's a shame no one can see it."

She blushed then, and once again Michelangelo decided that he liked that side of her too. She had an odd fidget when she blushed, and her cheeks lit up wonderfully. He couldn't help but grin.

"Would you like to…um, would you like to come in for some coffee or something?" she asked after a moment, regaining some of her composure as she slipped quietly into the safety of her apartment.

Although his mind said he was due back at any moment, and that is brothers might worry, he pushed it away when he stood up and openly walked in through her window.

"Sure, as long as there's food involved as well, I'm starved!"

"I think I might be able to arrange that…"

Surely, Michelangelo thought, this was the beginning of a beautiful new friendship?

Author's Note: Feedback is welcome. Comments and Critique are wanted, and Flames will be laughed at and used to warm my still cold-as-you-know-what feet.